Well, ONE of my first. And the quilting was done with PCQuilter--which I don't have anymore, so am learning to freehand--and don't expect EVER to be able to do spirals like that!

Really a beautiful quilt!

rabbit, that is a wonderful quilt and if i am seeing it right, you filled in with a different color, right? that's a great idea for making a border longer. so is the cornerstone idea, just because it says mitre, doesn't mean you have to, after all.

margaret, if you do piece, i think you should piece individually and in different places, so it's not as noticable (sp).

I piece borders all the time.

One time Eleanor Burns showed how to correct a pieced border that had a print that really did show where it was pieced. She cut a fussy cut of one of the flowers in the pattern and apliqued it over the seam, made it look good.

I've pieced borders. On one I did recently I had to cut the borders crosswise to get the design in the right orientation. To make the piecing less noticable I carefully matched the design. You can see the seam in the closeup of the border pic but it blends in pretty well on the overall photo.

http://www.quiltingboard.com/posts/list/12200.page


I prefer to put the seam a little off center, especially if I'm piecing both sides. That way I don't have two seams directly across from one another. Hope this makes sense.

I never cut my borders ahead of time. I wait until the top is pieced then square the top. I measure through the middle of the quilt lenghthwise and cut the lengthwise border. Do the same for crosswise. To splice the border for the necessary length is a personal preference. It's certainly easier to cut borders on the crossgrain and splice as needed. Sometimes I do that, but I REALLY love the look of an unspliced border. I just hate the hassle of cutting those perfect long lengths on the long grain. I've found that if I splice, where to place the splice really makes a difference. You don't want to place it near the edge of quilt. Sometimes that means wasting a lot of fabric, and I'm thinking I could have been better off yardage-wise cutting on the lengthwise grain.

Thanks! Actually, it isn't just cornerstones--there are pieces in the middle of each side as well.

I so want to make that quilt again, knowing what I know now. Everything besides the borders was on the bias! Ignorance was bliss...<g>

I don't think I've done any borders that weren't cut crosswise. I do press those seams open to keep as flat as possible and make sure the pieceing thread is light/dark enough, but once it's pressed and quilted, unless it was a mismatched stripe or something, I think the piecing would be completely unnoticeable.

where?